Very nice game

This was just the perfect game. Had everything I was looking for. A storyline, a mixture of hidden object scenes and thinking games. Once I figured out how to use the map...(Silly me) it went a lot faster then having to click back all the time.

Not everything is obvious and I had to peek at a few walk throughs to figure one or two things out, but over all it was a good time waster. My son enjoyed watching me play it and helped me as well.

I will be buying other titles of this as well. I really enjoyed it.

...is a hidden object game. Katy Reed returns to the mysterious House of 1,000 Doors to once again help the Lancasters and solve the mystery of troubled ghosts in various places and times.

A traditional hidden object game where you solve puzzles to unlock doors, find objects and solve problems, over half of which are hidden object puzzles where you have a screen filled with clutter in which you locate objects from a list. Other puzzles will often require you to find a key or missing piece before being able to complete it.

All areas, hand-drawn as usual, radiate from the same central area: the house, which has a corridor from where you can go to a few rooms further in the house or go to various locations in portals along the wall, each being a different location with its own puzzles and theme. You spend much less time in the house itself than you did in House of 1000 Doors: Family Secrets.

There's a decent amount of puzzles across the game, a few of which were challenging (such as the tile-moving puzzles), but the game also allows those that don't have the patience for these to skip them altogether. Puzzles other than hidden objects are sufficiently varied, no two looked alike and they got me scratching my head in different places.

Even with its lower resolution, the hand-drawn panels are clean and nice-looking, hidden objects are barely, if at all, distinguishable from the background or the rest of the clutter. Themes are varied as well, as you travel to a Buddhist temple, the Indian jungle, the Italian countryside, the Madagascar Island, with the bonus game being in northern Scandinavia.

While the story lacks proper conclusion, there is a story. Each ghost you help in the various locations have personally known Gabriel, the guardian of the House, and newspaper clippings and journals are spread in each location to give a portrait of what problems they've had. And while you don't speak with many of the House's inhabitants, your character is a bit more central to the story's resolution.

While occasionally repeating the same hidden object puzzle a second time is not uncommon in these games, here I've had to repeat each one twice, occasionally even three times! This, in addition to the exact same background music as the first game, is starting to feel like the developers were getting lazy. The voice acting sure didn't have much of an effort.

You're once again given little to no twist or unique take on the genre, nothing special you won't find in any and all hidden object games, no achievement or special tasks. There's no way to track your progress with the collectible "Beyond Objects", no way of figuring where you might've missed some, or identify a specific theme as they are absolutely random-looking.

The game is a lot more linear than the previous one. Solve a few puzzles, get a key to a portal. Once you've solved the portal's quest, you're booted out of that location, the portal is closed, and you're almost immediately given a key to a new portal. This is a step back from the previous game where you'dt travel back to some portals to solve the riddle of other portals.


Once again a passable hidden object game. I didn't get tired of it, even after playing the previous one not that long ago, but that probably speaks more of me enjoying such games than this specific one. I've seen better, I've seen worst, but House of 1000 Doors: The Palm of Zoroaster – Collector's Edition scratches the HOG itch.

—————————————————————————
This was just my opinion.

If you found this review helpful, please consider giving it a thumbs up, and feel free to check out more of my (purely opinionated) reviews.

This is the fourth game in this series, and the closest to a sequel of the first game House 1000 Doors: Family Secrets. (I have played all 4 games in the series, in order.) It is stand alone, as is, but the series storyline might confuse a player as the game briefly refers to previous game adventures in single "throw away/reveal" lines depending on how much of the series storyline is known.

The story: The Palm of Zoroaster, a cursed orb, has been destroying things, people and quite possibly civilizations (or at least, select parts of it) for centuries. Your job is to destroy the orb. (No spoilers because there are some if one has been following the series storyline.) Learn the orb's history, witness its destruction, and of course discover how to destroy it and gather the means to do so.

The game is set up with an introduction/tutorial, four adventure chapters, and the final conclusive chaper. I rather like this setup which is different then other HOs with a much more linear storyline. What changed in this game from the first game (Family Secrets) is the player does not get to choose which adventure to embark on first. For this game and storyline purposes it is perfect though.

Hidden object scenes, mixed with some head scratching puzzles and the usual standard puzzles, plus some point and click and a chapter by chapter accumulate and use inventory. Nothing too hard or tear your hair out challenging. Game comes with a walkthrough the player can access if they get stuck in game or on a puzzle. Every puzzle has a skip option and sparkles on needed objects or mini puzzle scene. Unless playing in Hard mode. There are three game modes available, in-game achievements, wall papers and a bonus chapter.

Warning: If you are hunting for those elusive extra "hidden/ghost/shape shifting" objects make sure you have them all before leaving the introduction or adventure chapter because you cannot go back once the chapter is finished. (Except in a new game).

Opinion: I like the series, therefore I like each game. The overall concept is interesting and lends itself to innumberable further games. The only thing I did not like in this game was the end. I was expecting a much longer cut scene. It ended and I thought "Wait, that is it." The adventure ended, the game ended, but the end felt truncated. Ah well the bonus chapter made up for the abrupt conclusion.

Evil has taken over at the House of 1,000 Doors since your last visit. It's up to you to travel through dimensions again to save everyone and particularly Gabriel, the protector of it.

This game is the sequel to House of 1,000 Doors: Family Secrets and you'll find some familiar characters, if not everyone from the first game. The plot is also a good written. You're going from China to the jungle, which means many exotic backgrounds for someone who is used to a western city.

The gameplay is the usual one: click on items that you'll need in another scene, solve puzzles, find hidden objects in specific areas, etc.. I found everything well-balanced. Also, you have close-up views in these hidden objects scenes and some objects you can move as they're also hiding items to find.

But what made me love the game, though I've hinted it earlier, is probably the journey through 4 different worlds and meet people that knew about Gabriel - I found it nice that the guy has a background, though it's breaking the charm around this mysterious man (but the more is known in the bonus chapter). And the scenes are really well drawed. You're really transported into other worlds.

The soundtrack is also nice but didn't change from the previous game.

So if you're a fan of HOG, you have to own this game. Besides, there are trading cards with nice emoticons and backgrounds.

Yes, in a boldly original move, I've decided to review the sequel right after the original game, if only so I don't have to reintroduce anything.

It's like the first game, only better. Review done?

Seriously though, the sequel managed to address most of my concerns regarding the first game.

The intro tutorial is actually connected to the main plot this time around - Kate (the protagonist) is driving around when the radio tells her the House keeps popping up in the same place and spewing weird fireballs. Thankfully, it's within driving distance - because a spooky mansion that can teleport through space and time will never leave New Jersey (which I guess is an appropriate substitute for eternal damnation). She stops at a gas station and the puzzle has to do with... no, not getting gas for your car. Why would you even think that? That part is handled for you. You have to retrieve the car keys from behind the sun visor (I remind you that we just drove to the gas station), and wash the car's windshield - Kate has suddenly grown very conscious of the dangers of poor visibility. But that's all stuff that doesn't make sense in retrospect, which is a huge improvement over the first game.

The plot is as follows - an enormous evil organ (no, you pervs, the mechanical kind) has taken over the house, and is spewing evil fireballs all the place. The residents assure you that they're deeply concerned. No, really.
The House finally justifies its moniker, by sending you to different times and places that were devastated by the evil fireballs (that don't really do anything of the sort in the house itself, because various rooms have backgrounds that are set in stone). You need to complete such fiendish puzzles as "brew some rose tea for the ghost" and "find all the animal figurines" in order to retrieve the [s]crystal[/s] skull hidden in each such location. The locations are fairly arbitrary, but it's nice to get out of the house and hang out in Tibet / Indiana Jones style lost temples / Roman-era Jerusalem.

Other improvements - the hints come back much faster this time around (half the time it took in the original). Once you've retrieved the skull in certain era, it's closed off for exploration, so you don't get lost, wondering whether the fan is meant to blow out the flames over the bird nest in Paris, or to shoo away the moths from the portrait in the pirate fortress. The map is right next to the hint button, instead of being hidden away in the journal section - much handier (my mom didn't even find the map during her first playthrough of the original), particularly since the game tends to double-dip into hidden object screens - you'll complete one in order to find a specific object, and a few puzzles later you'll have to do it all over again, finding a different set of items this time around.

So this is a fairly major improvement over the original.

I've played this game in a HOG-bundle which is 5-in-1 or something similar. I can recommend it to any HOG player but personally I liked the first chapter rather than this. Hovewer, its just a personal thought. This one is not worse than the Family Secrets technically. Furthermore it has a better map. Shortly, you must returnt the House of 100 Doors to stop the evil again. The story is solid, voice actings are good, HOG scenes and mini games are satisfactory. 7/10

Loved the first House of 1000 Doors and this one was just as good. Lots of hidden object scenes and not the same objects to find every time. Good story and not too easy. I only had to use a hint one time, but there were other times I thought I would have to. Great for those who play on Expert Mode!

A superior game to Family Secrets in all but one aspects, Palm of Zoroaster features improved level design, even better graphics and much easier puzzles, catering more for the more casual hidden object game fans.

The Palm of Zoroaster did exactly what is expected from a sequel: took everything that was good or popular in the first game, made it better, and threw out the rest.

There is no more boring running around. The titular house serves only as a nexus between the four distinct paintings/levels, all featuring their own new ghost story that eventually form a larger plot. What that plot is can be a good question though, since the game lacks an ending, it just stops after the last artefact. And no, the bonus chapter won’t help either, although it reveals a few interesting secrets on its own.

The difficulty has decreased substantially since the first game, and there is a much larger focus on hidden object scenes. The progression is more straightforward, but not linear, giving you a greater sense of pace despite the fairly long gameplay.

I must say this game is a pretty high quality hidden object gamee. The graphics are sharp and the voice acting is pretty good. When in full screen mode tehre are black bars on the sides of the window so keep that in mind if that sort of thing bothers you.

For the hidden object scenes you might eventually notice you're finding the same objects, just placed in a new picture but it's not that big of a deal. Tip: and awl is like an ice pick, I still don't actulaly know what it is.

In terms of puzzles there is a good variety although one or two are hard to tell what the game wants you to do but luckily there is a skip button.

Plot and storylinewise it's an interesting concept. I did not play the first one yet (I played them in the wrong order doh! I wondered why the main character referenced a time before this game...) so I'm not sure if this is covered there but I would like to explore the house a little more, while it would be boring to have the common typical, kitchen, dining room, etc I think there was potential to do really crazy rooms that had themes. While the different country aspect sort of covered that it didn't feel like part of the house.

Overall it's a nice game but it feels like the ending was a little rushed. The bonus chapter literally ends without any final dialogue which is dissapointing.

For what it is and does I'd say 9/10